


Night-blooms and Gargoyles

by SecondStarfall (beantiger)



Series: The Second Starfall Stories [15]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Crush at First Sight, Dorks in Love, F/F, Fairy Tale Elements, Fairy Tale Style, Fantasy, First Meetings, Flash Fic, Flowers, Gardens & Gardening, Guards, Late at Night, Lesbian Character, Medieval, Microfic, Mutual Pining, Originally Posted Elsewhere, She Left Me Roses By The Staaaairs, Work Sucks I Know
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-01-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:54:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22219624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beantiger/pseuds/SecondStarfall
Summary: She was lovely. The realization hit Marlesse with such an impact that she held her breath until it burned.***A widely-disliked guard falls in love with a gargoyle.
Relationships: Original Character(s)/Original Character(s), Original Female Character/Original Female Character
Series: The Second Starfall Stories [15]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1582975
Kudos: 11





	Night-blooms and Gargoyles

**Author's Note:**

> This is a version of the original Twitterfic, same(ish) title, posted over at my now-deactivated personal account in December 2019. It has been given minor edits for consistency with other stories and readability on AO3. ❤️ 
> 
> **SUGGESTED RE-READING:** Marlesse and Valériane first meet, unofficially, in this story. You'll want to read some tales that take place after, like...  
> * ["The Botanist's Most Important Failure"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21990349)  
> * ["A Certain Necklace of Jade"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22059523)  
> * ["Two Flawed Characters (Who Speak Through The Aster)"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22155733)
> 
> ✨ [[see the full SecStar timeline](https://secondstarfall.com/index.php/Official_Timeline) | [check out the SecStar wiki](https://secondstarfall.com/)] ✨

Marlesse de la Mer, the chief guard, found little joy in her job for many years—mostly because of her comrades, who, in the beginning, disliked her gravely.

She was kind, and good. She thought deeply.

That wasn't enough. (It rarely is, sad to say, dear reader.)

So despite the bile that rose within her each time she found herself walking the castle walls at night, Marlesse patrolled and patrolled well. It wasn't something her position required. She wanted to show her fellows, however, that she did not think herself any better than them, even as the thought of violent confrontation made her ears ring. 

If she had to press a sword into flesh again...

She glanced at the stars when she could, preferring their light over any kind of torch. Perhaps luck (Marlesse thought naively) would bring her uneventful nights.

***

But:

Once, in the royal gardens, Marlesse came upon a moving shadow among the night-blooms. The vague and unassuming form had all the presence of a passing breeze. A bone-peddler? A thief? Someone small, someone lithe and quick and ethereal.

"Who goes there?" called out Marlesse. "On the orders of Queen Alexandrine—"

A candle sparked in the gloom. 

"Oh," said the figure—a tiny woman just taller than a child, cowl-covered. She held the light in one hand and picked little white flowers with the other.

Marlesse tensed, approached. "You're trespassing upon royal—"

The woman, flame-bright, looked up at her. Exhaustion lined her eyes, and the ink-caked creases along her forehead told a story of studiousness and scrutiny.

She was lovely. The realization hit Marlesse with such an impact that she held her breath until it burned. 

Reader, nothing in her life had ever buffeted her with this kind of force. Not the births of her brothers, or forever leaving her mother and the boat and the sea. Not the deaths she had forced herself to watch on the field, and not meeting the queen herself in a graveyard. 

"Sandrine is something, is she not?" said the woman. "Won't let me have any of her primrose. As if I didn't procure the seeds for her in the first place—but here I am boring you..."

"Marlesse. De la Mer. Chief guard."

"Ah. She got rid of that nasty old man, then."

The guard blinked at her.

"I'm the one they call the gargoyle," the woman said.

Marlesse unpacked months of overheard gossip, banter, lewd jokes.

She said to herself: _The queen's botanist. The recluse. Poisoner, doctor..._

She said to herself: _This small creature?_

"At any rate. That," said the botanist, "is all you probably care to know."

She blew the candle out, and Marlesse felt distraught, suddenly, that she could no longer see the botanist's face.

"I care to know a lot," Marlesse said. "Why are you out in the dark, my lady?" 

Surprise weighed heavy in the pause that ensued.

"Well," said the botanist, her voice soft, "trust a gargoyle on this: it's nothing, I promise. Nothing of interest. Just supplies. All for a mad woman's studies in her mad little tower."

And she was gone. 

Marlesse looked to the stars again, then to the castle's southernmost tower—the one that even the servants avoided, with fingers of ivy caressing its sides. She had a desire like hunger, dear reader, to see this botanist again, if only to commit her features to memory. 

In the light, yes—

The botanist's eyes, her cheeks, her voice, enumerating all the answers Marlesse wanted to know, recounting the history Marlesse needed to hear.

She continued her patrol, soft-hearted.

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment or a kudos or whatever the heck if this tickled your fancy. There shall be more! ❤️ Also, please let me know what other characters, relationships, or places you'd like to hear about. I have lots of ideas, but I'd enjoy writing a few stories for y'all as well.
> 
> ✨ [[see the full SecStar timeline](https://secondstarfall.com/index.php/Official_Timeline) | [check out the SecStar wiki](https://secondstarfall.com/)] ✨
> 
>  **AUTHOR'S COMMENTARY:** I am a sucker for love between two misunderstood and hurt people. I hope you like that trope because it is literally never going to stop coming out of me, ever, in pretty much any capacity.


End file.
